March 16, 2016

Rain drizzles – amazing water effects

After just posting about photographing the rainy reflections found on my back patio, we soon had another round of rain which was followed by some steady drizzles. Yep, there was a similar refection on my patio (changes a little bit each time), but no call to action on my part. That is until I went to another window looking out on my back yard just as the drizzles were finishing and my roses were illuminated by a soft indirect light coming though the remaining thin clouds. I was immediately dazzled by a sea of shimmering leaves, as if these were layered with jewels. So much so that I jumped into a pair of out-door shoes and went out to investigate. What I found was really interesting.

The rain drops were nicely formed and sitting like small crystal beads on top and along the edges of the rose leaves; amazing! I am not a chemist per se, but I suspect that this visual treat was created from a combination of the tension of the pure water (yes, not going to get this same effect with the domestic water out of the house-hose; too many chemicals) and the new spring rose leaves. I just could not stop taking photographs with my smartphone, which I have learned focuses very close to be able to achieve these results. This was actually a lot of fun.

So after many years of photography, I am beginning to suspect that a 100 mm macro for the 5DMk3 maybe in my future.

Below are the additional images that I created from this morning’s shoot which were tweaked in-camera with SnapSeed, subsequently posting these directly to Instagram (@douglasstockdale) and shared on Facebook. Bottom most is a color version of one of my compositions.